Wall St. Closes Lower on Political Uncertainty

By The Associated Press

Nov. 2, 2016

Stocks on Wall Street retreated for a seventh consecutive day on Wednesday, the market’s longest decline in five years, as worries about the United States presidential election continued to weigh on investors.

A steep decline in oil prices also shook investor confidence.

The Dow Jones industrial average lost 77.46 points, or 0.4 percent, to 17,959.64. The Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index lost 13.78 points, or 0.7 percent, to 2,097.94, and the Nasdaq composite fell 48.01 points, or 0.9 percent, to 5,105.57.

The last time the S.&P. 500 fell for seven straight days was November 2011, during a flare-up of the European sovereign debt crisis.

Like most of the public, investors have their eyes glued to the presidential race, as polls between Hillary Clinton and Donald J. Trump have tightened. The narrowing in the race has brought more uncertainty. Gold and bond prices have risen. The VIX, a volatility measure known as the fear gauge on Wall Street, jumped almost 9 percent on Tuesday to its highest level since June. It was up another 4 percent Wednesday.

The Mexican peso, which has become a de facto proxy for Mr. Trump’s chance of victory, has fallen steadily against the United States dollar since Friday and fell another 1 percent on Wednesday to 19.425 pesos to the dollar. Investors expect that Mexico’s economy could be damaged by a Trump administration, which in turn would hurt the peso.

“The lead-up to the U.S. presidential election was always expected to be lively, but the events of the last couple of days have seriously taken a toll on investor sentiment,” said Craig Erlam, senior market analyst at Oanda.

A report from the Energy Department that showed a significant buildup in crude oil supplies last week weighed heavily on oil and energy prices. Benchmark crude oil sank $1.33, to $45.34 a barrel in New York. Brent crude, the international standard, fell $1.41, to $48.30 a barrel.

Aside from the election, investors parsed the latest policy statement from the Federal Reserve. While the nation’s central bank voted to keep rates at the current level after its two-day meeting ended Wednesday, policy makers left the door open to raise rates at their meeting in December. It was generally thought the Fed would not want to raise rates ahead of the election.

“If we get an unexpected election outcome, the Fed might put any increase on hold. We are not convinced that December is a sure thing,” said Brandon Swensen, a portfolio manager and co-head of fixed-income trading at RBC Global Asset Management.

The yield on the 10-year Treasury note fell to 1.80 percent from 1.83 percent the day before.

In individual company news, Brocade Communications rose $1.08, nearly 10 percent, to $12.32 after Broadcom announced it would buy the company for $5.5 billion. Broadcom rose $3.76, or 2.2 percent, to $172.56.

The dollar fell to 103.38 yen from 104.04 yen, while the euro rose to $1.1090 from $1.1049.